


Midnight.

by MollyMaryMarie



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: October 31st 1981, POV Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew's Betrayal, Subtly Implied WolfStar, The Darkest Night in the Life of Sirius Black
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-10
Updated: 2016-03-10
Packaged: 2018-05-25 23:39:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6214786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MollyMaryMarie/pseuds/MollyMaryMarie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the night of October 31st, 1981, Sirius Black lost everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midnight.

**[To be read to Coldplay’s Midnight.]**

 

_[Instrumental intro]_

 

His assurances of peace – to himself, in his mind – are muffled over the violent roar of the motorcycle, the only sound in the stillness. Yet, he can’t even hear the engine growl over the terrified pounding of his heart. Everything’s _not_ fine. He can _feel_ it.

If only he could’ve apparated to them. If only he hadn’t made such a timid thing as Peter their Secret Keeper. Peter was hardly skilled enough to have been able to protect them. He barely even trusted Peter to protect _himself_. Now he couldn’t reach Peter. Or Lily. Or James.

Sirius thought again, for an incalculable number of times, of how it should’ve been him, that he should have been there with them. He couldn’t entertain the thought that Peter had betrayed them. The idea lit his chest on fire. His eyes struggled to focus on the empty air ahead of him, the tears already threatening.

Godric’s Hollow appeared suddenly below him and he yanked the thundering vehicle down in the direction of their house. Immediately, every muscle clenched to the point of aching.

 

_[In the darkness before the dawn. In the swirling of the storm.]_

           

The front door was wide open. People were peering from their yards, but keeping a safe distance. The sudden drop in his stomach sickened him. He plowed through the lawn with the motorcycle, leaping from it before it had even come to a stop.

He heard himself shout the name of his best friend, his voice cracking as he began desperately praying for a response. He shouted again – his own voice somehow seemed so distant – his feet were pounding hard on the soft grass as he scrambled toward the door.

 

_[When I’m rolling with the punches, and hope is gone. Leave a light, a light on_.]

           

Before he could even get through the threshold, he fell to his knees as he came upon the one thing he had always feared. In front of him was the body of his best friend – lifeless.

In a desperate panic, filled with disbelief, he rushed to the side of James Potter and lifted his body into his lap, calling his name, as endless tears fell from his face onto the cold cheeks of the man in his arms. He begged him to wake up.

 

_[Instrumental]_

 

Suddenly, an even more sickening thought occurred to him. He couldn’t hear the cries of a baby. He couldn’t hear the cries of little Harry. Maybe worse still, neither could he hear the soft cooing of a mother trying to comfort him. Where was Lily?

He bent his neck to place his forehead against James’ and was broken over the missing warmth he usually found there. Hesitantly, he stood on shaking legs, his own weight nearly enough to bring him down, but he drudged on, his breathing labored, his stomach churning.

 He called out to Lily – or, is pretty sure he called out – he began to doubt it the longer it went unanswered. As he made his way up the stairs, he steadied himself against the wall.

 

_[Millions of miles from home. In the swirling, swimming on.]_

 

The moment he turned into Harry’s room, he covered his mouth to stifle the alarmed, shattered sound that escaped his lips when he laid his eyes on the body of Lily Potter. His knees buckled and he collapsed by her side, reaching out with trembling hands to gently brush the bright red hair from her face, and close her once-brilliant green eyes. Tears poured down his paled cheeks and he found himself placing his throbbing head in his hands, sobbing.

 

_[When I’m rolling from the thunder, but bleed from thorns. Leave a light, a light on.]_

 

In one night, in one moment – he had lost _everything_. James and Lily Potter had been his family, the ones he turned to in the bleakest moments of his life. The ones who held him together.

A sudden noise drew him out of his darkness. His head snapped up as he looked directly at Harry, standing in his crib – a frighteningly horrid scar on his forehead, and enormous tears pooling in his eyes – the eyes so much like his mother’s – but otherwise, very much alive. The child smiled at Sirius as he went to gather him in his arms. Softly, he placed his lips into the boy’s hair, breathing in deeply the lingering scent of his parents and squeezing him tightly.

 

_[Leave a light, a light on.]_

           

A presence behind them shook Sirius from his memories – he turned, craning his neck to look up into the face of Rubeus Hagrid.

 

_[Instrumental]_

 

Hagrid moved to take Harry from him – Sirius flinched, taking a step backward. He begged Hagrid to let him take him home, to raise Harry as his own – he was the boy’s godfather, after all. The awful suspicion in Hagrid’s expression gave him the answer he was dreading. Everyone _suspected_ him. They had made Peter their Secret Keeper surreptitiously, under Sirius’ suggestion – to keep it from the one Dumbledore proposed to be the spy – Remus.

They would never let him keep Harry. Not while they accused him of being the deliberate cause of this monstrous crime. Reluctantly, he delivered the boy to Hagrid’s waiting arms. He had to find out who had done this – who had given up the Potter’s location. It _couldn’t_ have been Peter. He wouldn’t have betrayed them. _Would_ he?

 

_[Vocalization]_

 

In the back of Sirius’ mind, he recalled how nervous Peter had become. At the time, he had attributed it to fear. Fear of Voldemort, fear of torture, fear of not being able to keep a secret of this magnitude on pain of death. Every memory from the last several months poured into his mind at once – he remembered often not being able to find Peter, or hearing him mumbling to himself under his breath, or watching him sweat as he glanced around a room.

It was suddenly so clear. It _hadn’t_ been fear of being found by Voldemort. He already _had_ been. It was fear of what Voldemort would do to him if he let him down. It was fear of James and Sirius finding out what he had become, what he had done to save himself.

 

_[Leave a light, a light on. Leave a light, a light on.]_

 

In vibrating anger, Sirius fled to the window next to Harry’s crib. As he expected, the petrified face of Peter Pettigrew peered out from the back corner of the adjacent house.

Their eyes met. Sirius violently screamed out his name, his voice breaking under the strain. Peter fled. And without hesitation, Sirius dove from the window after him.

 

_[Instrumental]_

 

Sirius’ shattering voice echoed through the alleyways, resonated into the empty night, screeching Peter’s name, throwing hexes erratically as he blindly tore after him, unaware of the attention that he was attracting. Nothing else mattered. Pettigrew would pay for what he had done.  

After everything the four of them had gone through at Hogwarts – after all the train rides together, and the late nights in their shared dormitory, and the full moons in the shack. After they had kept Remus’ secret all those years, kept the secret of their effort to become Animagi together.

After everything – how could he have done this? Nothing Voldemort could’ve done, or threatened to do, would have forced Sirius to give up his best friends. _Nothing._ He would have died first. And it should have been him – he _should_ have died in their places.

 

_[Electronic Instrumental]_

 

Finally, he cornered Pettigrew – there was nowhere left for him to run. Sirius spewed profanities at him, wand at the ready. Peter stood terrified, shaking, crying, apologizing.

A crowd rushed to where they stood in stalemate. As Sirius began to turn toward them, Peter began screaming about how Sirius himself was the culprit – that _he_ had given up the Potters to Voldemort, because he _was_ still their Secret Keeper, after all, and a Black was a Black, no matter which house he had been sorted into. There was no changing his bloodline. 

Sirius’ malicious gaze flew back in the direction of Pettigrew, and for a brief moment, the look on Peter’s face was thoroughly conceited, as if proud that he had done this – that he had pinned all of this on Sirius and he would get away with it.

Without thinking, with a flick of his wrist, Sirius brutally screamed a curse at Pettigrew, his voice being drowned in the deafening explosion that followed. Sirius was taken aback – he hadn’t meant to do it. It shouldn’t have recoiled that way.

Before he could turn, there were hands on him from every direction – a group of men forcefully pushed him down to the ground. People were screaming. _Peter Pettigrew is dead._ _Sirius Black betrayed the Potters._ Tears immediately filled Sirius’ eyes, falling swiftly onto the pavement directly beneath him.

Straining to look up, he implored those around him to listen to him – he hadn’t meant to kill Peter. It was an accident. He had just been so angry. But he was _not_ a Death Eater. James and Lily were two of his best friends. He would’ve died before giving them up.

His panicked gaze fell on the face of Remus – his surprised eyes dull red from having witnessed the same scene Sirius had – his best friends, murdered – and now, this one.

Sirius begged him – _Remus, please._ He had to believe him – Remus had to know that Sirius wouldn’t have done this. He loved James and Lily. He loved _him_. His voice broke as he pleaded with his former best friend. Remus stood, immobile, face set in stone, jaw clenched.

 

And with tears slipping unnumbered down his cheeks, Remus turned silently. Sirius screamed his name savagely, fighting against those pinning him, keeping him from Remus. His wounded screams echoed into the darkness. Remus fell from his sight, invisible in the crowd.

 

_[In the darkness before the dawn. In the darkness before the dawn.]_

 

At midnight on November the 3rd, 1981, Sirius Orion Black had nothing to celebrate for his 22nd birthday. In a single, crippling Halloween night, he had lost all four of his best friends – three of them dead, and one of those by his own hand. Every cell in his body shrieked at him with guilt, regret, agony, torment.

 

_[Leave a light, a light on. Leave a light, a light on.]_

 

Crumpled in the corner of his dark, damp cell, his head buried deep within his knees, his hands clasped tightly over his knotted hair, Sirius Black let out a devastated aching, howling, bone-shattering scream that resounded into the blackest, vilest depths of Azkaban – the echo of which caused even the Dementors to give pause, if only for one debilitating moment.


End file.
